Is now the right time for a car company as renowned for its spectacular engines as Ferrari to be launching a massively powerful, massively expensive performance EV? One look at the market would suggest perhaps not, but there’s no going back now for the Italian manufacturer. It’s just unveiled a hugely geeky rundown of the tech underpinning its first fully electric car, which it’s currently calling the Elettrica.
The press release is pretty impenetrable, full of terms like “motorsports-derived Halbach array configuration” and “maximum angular acceleration”, but it boils down to this: a peak of over 986bhp (a nice, round 1000ps), a top speed of 193mph, and 0-62mph in 2.5 seconds.
Ferrari Elettrica – powertrain detail
That’s going to come by way of a quad-motor setup, with two e-motors at either end. All the componentry is integrated directly into the axles, reducing size and weight and improving efficiency and power density. The ones at the rear spin at up to 25,500rpm, and the fronts up to 30,000rpm. Under normal driving, the car will be rear-wheel drive and produce up to 831bhp, with the 281bhp front axle called upon when conditions require it. Under hard launches, the rear axle will momentarily be able to deliver a staggering 5900lb ft of torque to the wheels.
Those motors are fed by a 122kWh battery, providing over 329 miles of quoted range, integrated into the floorpan and dropping the centre of gravity by 80mm over an equivalent ICE car. That battery is structural, contributing to the overall stiffness of the bodyshell, and housed in a chassis designed to be as short-wheelbase as possible – under three metres – and place the driver close to the front in a cab-forward layout. In a Ferrari first, the car will have an independent rear subframe, which apparently houses the rear suspension in such a way that it reduces noise and increases refinement without compromising dynamics.
Ferrari Elettrica – subframe
Said suspension is an evolution of the 48V active system found on the Purosangue and F80, able to independently modulate movement at all four corners. For the first time in a Ferrari, suspension comfort settings will be separated out from other drive modes in the car’s systems. Those systems, controlled by the usual Mannetino switch, will range from a winter-friendly Ice mode to the full rear-wheel drive, you’re-on-your-own-pal ESC Off setting. There’ll also be a separate e-Mannetino, offering three different settings that affect the amount of power produced and how many axles are driven.
All very good, but what about the thing everyone’s worried about in an electric Ferrari – noise? Well, Ferrari says it hasn’t tried to directly recreate the sound of a combustion engine, which may or may not be a good thing, depending on your point of view.
Ferrari Elettrica – chassis
Instead, it’s taking an unusual approach – it won’t pull the usual fast EV trick of digitally generating sound, but instead essentially projects the mechanical soundtrack of the powertrain through an amplifier on the rear axle, a process it says draws inspiration from an electric guitar. Seriously. The car will get a Hyundai Ioniq 5 N-style ‘manual’ mode, too, with this amplified motor noise reflecting this.
There’s still one big question hovering around the Ferrari EV: what’s it going to look like? It seems increasingly likely it’s going to err towards a baby Purosangue vibe, and today’s announcement confirms it certainly won’t be a two-seater, as it confirms the chassis’s been designed to ensure rear passengers have as much space as possible.
Ferrari Elettrica – powertrain detail
This, then, answers lots of our questions about the Elettrica (if that is indeed its real name), but we’ll still likely be waiting until next year to see the finished product. In the meantime, does any of this put your mind at ease about the idea of an electric Ferrari?
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